The Master Profession 



A Challenge to the Young Men 
of the Twentieth Century 



SMITH BAKER, D.D. 

AND 

FRANK E. JENKINS, D.D. 



Atlanta, Georgia : 

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1908 



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COPYRIGHT, 1908. 

By THE FRANKLIN-TURNER COMPANY. 



TO 

WHO MEAN TO LIVE WHILE THEY LIVE 

AND TO MAKE THEIR LIVES 

WORTH WHILE 



" I have written unto you, young men, 
because ye are strong." 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Foreword 9 

I. The Master Profession 13 

II. How to Fill the Pews 25 

III. Old Young Ministers : or The Dead I,ine 53 

IV. Why, If I Were to Live My Life Over 

Again, I Would Enter the Ministry — A 
Testimony of Experience 81 

V. The Challenge 99 



FOREWORD 

Rev. Smith Baker, D. D., preached in the 
Central Congregational Church, of Atlanta, 
Georgia, from October i, 1907, to March I, 
1908. The writer heard him several times, 
and often heard of him and the remarkable 
impression he made in the city. That impres- 
sion remains months afterwards. His four 
months in the pulpit of this church will be per- 
manently reckoned among the formative forces 
of the life of this strong and growing church. 

At seventy-two Smith Baker is preaching 
the best sermons of his fifty years in the min- 
istry. He is young as the youngest, and his 
youthful force at seventy-two has in it all the 
energy of fifty years of growing strength. 

Seeing all this, and knowing the cry that 
is going over the country from all denomina- 
tions for more and more efficient ministers, the 
9 



FOREWORD 

writer urged Dr. Baker to write a book on 
"Pastoral Experiences, or Why, if I Were 
Again Twenty, I Would Choose the Ministry 
as My Life Work." Chapter IV of this book 
was his response to this request. "I can not 
tell these personal things," he said. Finally, 
chapter II and then chapter III were drawn 
out of him. 

Then the writer decided to try to complete 
the plan he had in mind the best he could, 
and the result is chapters I and V. But the 
real book is Dr. Baker's three chapters. 

The men of the churches are ready for new, 
manly activities. There is a clear call from 
them for leadership. 

The old activities of the church have largely 
spent their force in producing modern Chris- 
tendom and civilization. A new Christendom 
and a better civilization demand new activi- 
ties. God and man call for a larger and 
stronger and more vital ministry — for leader- 
ship equal to the needs and opportunities of 
this vigorous century. 



FOREWORD 

Ministers must be men among men; funda- 
mental thinkers among specialists; men of 
moral and spiritual energies directed to the 
uplifting of all that is truly human. 

Here is the challenge to the young men of 
to-day. F.* E. J. 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

1. THE WORK TO BE DONE 

According to the Genesis story the human 
race began its history in a Paradise. Sin came 
and Paradise was lost. 

But Paradise is to be regained. The whole 
round world is to be the Paradise of the human 
race in its Golden Age yet to be. The lost 
likeness is to be restored, line for line, grace 
for grace, beauty for beauty. Dominion over 
self is to be restored and then dominion over 
all the earth and all that moves upon it. The 
thorn and the brier are to go ; the fir-tree and 
the myrtle-tree are to take their place. The 
sighing of creation is to cease, and singing is 
to be heard in its stead. Warfare is to issue 
into peace; sorrow into joy. 

"Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on 
earth as it is heaven," is a prayer to be an- 
13 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

swered on this earth in the history of man. 
The law of love is to be humanity's universal 
law written in all hearts and lives. 

It is a gigantic enterprise. It means calling 
forth the secrets of nature and making them 
the common property of mankind. It means 
harnessing the forces of nature and making 
them obey man's hands upon the reins. It 
means distance as a hindrance to man's largest 
living annihilated. It means the touch of man's 
fingers enforced with the might of Niagara 
and the thunderbolt, and with the taste and 
skill that paint the lily. It means remedies 
for all ills; supplies for all needs; power for 
all achievements. 

More than this, it means a transformed hu- 
manity. 

Mankind — all races and tribes — is to be- 
come intelligent. Nature, self, and God are to 
be apprehended by all. The practical forces of 
life are to be comprehended with the largeness 
and the glory of it. 

Human brotherhood is to be universally 
14 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

recognized. "All ye are brethren" is to be the 
realization of all peoples. The governments 
are to be resolved into a theocratic democracy. 
Government of the people, by the people, and 
for the people, must be of, by, and for a people 
who have enthroned God in their intelligence, 
heart, and conscience, so that He rules in their 
free acts. 

All social relations are to have selfishness 
eliminated and love their supreme law. Cap- 
ital and labor are to find a method of living to- 
gether in the unity of brotherhood. Racial, 
sectional, and sectarian hatred are to disap- 
pear. Evil and injurious habits and practices 
are to be given up. Unsanitary conditions — 
physical, mental, moral, and spiritual — are to 
be displaced by sanitary conditions, and en- 
vironment is to be perfected to human needs 
and possibilities. 

Sin, as moral guilt, as missing the mark of 
life, and as a destructive force, is to be ex- 
pelled from the human will and constitution, 
and humanity is to stand forth in the image 

15 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

of God triumphant and uplifted. It is a noble 
program. How is it to be accomplished? 

2. THE AGENCY 

In the fullness of time, God gave the agency. 
His Son became incarnate and dwelt on earth 
full of grace and truth. He gave His mes- 
sage; He set forth His ideal; He went to 
the Cross and made it the manifestation of 
His and the Father's love. He showed in 
actual life what the spirit of true life is, and 
should ever be. He then withdrew into the 
unseen and sent His spirit to become incarnate 
in His disciples. He organized His church 
and committed to it the work He had begun. 
Through its members it is to make disciples of 
all nations, to initiate them into the common 
family of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, 
and to teach them to follow from their hearts 
all His teachings as to real, abundant life. 

It became "the permanent organ of society's 
life." Modern civilization is its best product 
so far; but its work is only just begun. It 

16 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

is to keep performing its assigned part until 
the program of the world's progress is com- 
pleted, and society is brought to its full salva- 
tion, to its larger life, to its ultimate earthly- 
glory. Heaven opens before the individual 
worker as he drops out of his earthly place, 
but it comes as the result of the earthly pos- 
session and practice of the heavenly spirit. 

Twelve men, increased by Jesus' and the 
twelve's personal activities to one hundred and 
twenty, have made modern history and the 
possibility of a future Golden Age. Energized 
by the coming spirit, they were multiplied into 
thousands and then millions. Their pathway 
through the world is the only pathway of life 
and light that has been. All else of human 
doings is stereotyped, unprogressive, dead or 
dying. 

Twelve men have produced a quiet revolu- 
tion which has become an irresistible evolution 
whose issue is to be perfected humanity. 

The church has been imperfect; but it has 
been the best and has produced the best there 
17 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

has been. It has not always lived up to its 
ideal; but its ideal has become progressive 
humanity's standard. Its own teaching is 
calling far in advance of itself, "Come on to 
the standard." 

It has to adjust itself in organization and 
methods to each changing age, but sooner or 
later it leads to better things. 

The church in the early years of the twentieth 
century finds that it has largely spent the en- 
ergy of its old methods. Its teachings are far 
ahead of it. A revival of righteousness has 
leaped beyond it. It is looking around in some 
bewilderment. Men's clubs, laymen's move- 
ments, leagues, classes, etc., multiply. 

The church is getting its bearings and pre- 
paring for new and larger activities than ever 
before. A few years hence and the whole 
world will vibrate with a new energy. All the 
sweetness and penetrating power of a feminine 
Christianity will remain, as it ought to, while 
there will come the sturdy, vigorous, resound- 
ing blows of manly consecration. The men of 
18 






THE MASTER PROFESSION 

the church who have caught a vision of the 
manly Christ will arise to make disciples of all 
mankind and bring them to the high standard 
of Christ. 

3. THE POWER 

Human conditions must change to the ideal 
in the actual, and the gospel is the only power 
that can do it. But the gospel that can do it 
is no namby-pamby, get-to-heaven-when-you- 
die sort. It is the power of God unto salva- 
tion — the casting out of all that is foreign to 
true living and the bringing in of all that be- 
longs to triumphant, abounding life. It is 
no mere stand-up or lift-your-hand-and-be- 
saved variety ; but the placing of divine power 
and love in the heart — the fountain-head of 
all life. It brings a new formative principle 
into all thought, feeling, purpose, and activity. 
It is adapted to the actual nature and needs of 
man, and transforms by its living, never-ceas- 
ing power. It is evangelical, but in no nar- 
row, unmeaning sense. It is good news, pres- 
19 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

ent and active, instructive, guiding, energiz- 
ing. 

4. THE LEADERSHIP 

The leadership of the church, the transform- 
ing organization of the ages, is the ministry. 
The minister is called Bishop, because he over- 
sees the work of the church; Pastor, because 
he guides, protects, and feeds it; Teacher, be- 
cause he instructs it as to the truth; Evan- 
gelist, because in its name he goes to the out- 
side world with the message of life; Minister, 
because he watches for the needs and possi- 
bilities of the people, and sees that the first 
is supplied and the second heeded; Elder, be- 
cause he is to exercise well-tried wisdom for 
those in need of it; Steward, because to him 
are committed the grace and power of God; 
Priest, because with his fellow priests in the 
membership of the church he is to stand be- 
tween God and lost men representing God to 
them and them to God until they are recon- 
ciled ; Prophet, because he is to proclaim the 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

will of God to individuals, to communities, and 
to nations. 

It is the master profession. It inspires and 
teaches the fundamental principles of every- 
thing. It presents ideals to all — men, women, 
children; educated and uneducated; rich and 
poor ; sick and well ; people of ten talents and 
of one; the leaders and the followers; the 
aggressive and the acquiescent. It teaches the 
meaning of human government and its great 
principles; the place of business and how it 
can be glorified ; the social life and how it may 
be exalted; scholarship and how it may con- 
tribute to human weal. 

A great ministry will make great lawyers, 
physicians, teachers, business men, home-mak- 
ers, statesmen, philanthropists, investigators, 
etc. It does not teach the details of any, but 
it gives impulse and inspiration to all. Gen- 
eral medical practice is now a specialty, ad- 
ministering to minor health needs and know- 
ing where to send all greater needs for the 
special skill needed. The ministry is the gen- 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

eral practitioner who impels and guides all to 
their specialist and specialty in life. 

It takes a large man to fill well such a pro- 
fession. The twentieth century must have 
large men in the ministry; men with a vision, 
men without selfishness, men who can achieve. 
The clerical society dude, the finically nice 
man, the mere essay-writer, the mere rhetori- 
cian, the glib wordmaker — all these have had 
their day in the ministry. The twentieth cen- 
tury calls for a vital ministry; for men who 
will make their personalities — trained, devel- 
oped, consecrated, charged with the love of 
humanity and the power of God — tell on 
human conditions for their transformation in- 
to divine ideals. The vital ministry is a doer 
in the fullest sense, but it is far more. It is 
an inspirer of doers in every department of 
life. It is a leader of the manifold ministries 
of the church. The minister of the twentieth 
century must especially lead men into activities 
for the uplifting of all peoples and all classes. 
He must inspire a new world leadership. He 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

must lead men to see religion with its cant 
cast out, its littleness gone, its false standards 
overthrown, its largeness displayed. The re- 
ligion he teaches is the source of true living 
and working; the gospel he preaches is the 
power that makes possible the art of living 
according to its science. From every point of 
view the true ministry is the master profes- 
sion. 



23 



II. 

HOW TO FILL THE PEWS 

By SMITH BAKER. D.D. 

A few people attend church by the force of 
their own spiritual life, regardless of the 
ability of the preacher. Any religious service 
that is loyal to Christ is precious to them. 

Others attend service from a sense of duty. 
They may not enjoy the preaching, but they 
believe in religion, in the church, and feel they 
ought to attend; and long after the preacher 
has failed to interest them, they continue the 
habit from loyalty to the church. 

A few others attend because they have been 
brought up to do so — it is the respectable 
thing. These three classes comprise the vast 
majority of those present in the most of our 
congregations. 

The Roman Catholic Church has its large 
congregations not from the great spirituality 
25 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

of its members or their particular interest in 
religious truth or the superior talent or elo- 
quence of its preaching; for, as a rule, it falls 
far short in culture or eloquence of the Prot- 
estant pulpit, but from the exaltation of the 
church as an institution in the minds of its peo- 
ple. Loyalty to the church rather than spirit- 
uality or interest in religious truth or the talent 
of the preacher is what calls out the majority 
of Roman Catholic worshipers. 

Protestantism holds no whip over its mem- 
bers; it comes with no assumed church au- 
thority. Its influence is all moral, intellectual, 
and spiritual; hence, its power to draw people 
depends upon how much it reaches the mind, 
heart, or spirit, one or all of these parts of 
man's nature. It does not compel; it influ- 
ences. Thus, it can not trust to the authority 
of the church, or the idolatry of the mass, 
but to such a presenting of the truth as shall 
touch the intellect, the heart, and the spirit 
of the man. Hence, it requires more of a 
man to be a good minister than it does to be a 
26 



HOW TO FILL THE PBWS 

good priest. The strength of the Protestant 
church to reach men who are not spiritually 
or personally interested in religious questions 
depends upon the social, sympathetic atmos- 
phere of the church and the power of the 
minister as a preacher, but mainly upon the 
ability of the man in the pulpit. It may be 
this ought not to be true; but it is, and be- 
cause this great fact has been forgotten, far 
too many churches have failed to reach the 
masses. There is a fundamental truth in the 
saying, "Fill the pulpit and the pews will be 
filled.'' President Tucker has said, "The se- 
verest criticism upon any man's preaching is 
empty pews." That church and that preach- 
ing are not a success which only draw the 
spiritual people who would come anyway, or 
those who come from a sense of duty. The 
business of the preacher is not simply to 
preach the truth, but so to preach it as to 
reach and interest those who have no religious 
interest in it. 

The pulpit should not only hold the fort, 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

but make constant conquests upon the world. 
The most important part of preaching is not 
to build up the church, but to reach the un- 
saved. The preacher's most anxious question 
is not, "Am I satisfying the church?" but, 
"Am I reaching the outside world?" "How 
many people who have not been in the habit of 
attending church are being induced to come?" 
The preacher should be a drawing speaker 
— a popular preacher — a minister whom sin- 
ners love to hear. Do not start at these words. 
The expression, "A drawing preacher," has 
been used in sarcasm by little men to justify 
their own dullness. No expression has been 
more abused than "popular preaching." Peo- 
ple have sneered at it as undignified and al- 
most a reproach, but no other preacher was 
ever so popular a speaker as Jesus Christ. 
The multitudes hung upon his lips, not only 
because of what he said, but because of how 
he said it. Paul and Peter were popular 
preachers whom the masses followed. Au- 
gustine and St. Francis and Luther and Wes- 



HOW TO FILL THE PEWS 

ley and Whitefield and Edwards and Payson 
and Simpson and Beecher and Spurgeon and 
Parker and Brooks were all popular preachers. 
The cry against popular preaching is generally 
an attempt to apologize for tame preaching. 

Such sneering is contemptible. All men 
can not be great preachers like those named 
above, but every man can be interesting or else 
he ought to resign. Dullness has no excuse 
in the pulpit. It is either the result of laziness 
or a lack of spirituality or of natural ability. 

Popularity does not mean sensationalism in 
the common use of that word. Here, again, 
there has been a vast amount of cheap talk 
about sensationalism in the pulpit, as though 
it was a common fault and a common demand, 
neither of which is true. 

The truth is, there is very little sensational- 
ism in the pulpit. Take the Saturday papers 
of Boston or New York or Chicago or At- 
lanta, when there are from seventy-five to a 
hundred pulpit notices, and not one in fifty 
will have a sensational topic. While there is 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

now and then an exception, the preachers of 
our church are surprisingly free from sensa- 
tionalism. It is time such nonsense were done ; 
for forty-nine out of fifty preachers are free 
from it. True sensationalism in the sense of 
calling attention by the interesting or striking 
way in which the truth is presented is not only 
right, but a sacred duty. This does not re- 
quire resorting to novel methods or topics, 
but only a proper artistic way of securing at- 
tention. The few men who resort to the cheap 
sensationalism, clap-trap methods, have only 
a short success and gain no real power; while 
the most popular preachers, men who draw 
outsiders and reach the people and fill the pews, 
are those who, as a rule, cleave to the old 
gospel and preach the great fundamentals. 

The most popular preachers are not super- 
ficial, but the most of them are such men as 
have deep convictions upon eternal realities. 
There is nothing so popular as good public 
speaking, and there is no kind of public speak- 
ing so popular as preaching when rightly 
30 



HOW TO FILL THE PEWS 

done. "Dull as a sermon" is a slander caused 
by lazy or unconverted preachers. The great- 
est eloquence in the world has been in the 
pulpit. The vast majority of the finest public 
speaking in the world to-day is in the pulpit, 
and the greatest opportunity for the highest 
and broadest oratory is still in the pulpit. A 
pulpit on fire has always filled the pews. 

A pulpit on fire to-day will fill the pews. 
We do not mean more noise or nervousness or 
only an appeal to the emotions, though preach- 
ing which does not reach the emotions is poor 
stuff. We mean the truth on fire in a man's 
soul — not simply believed in the head — blaz- 
ing out of the heart. The weakness of the 
pulpit is cold preaching. A pound of coal on 
fire will heat a room more than a ton piled 
into an artistic display. Some ministers do 
not know the difference between the truth in 
the head and the truth in the heart. They are 
forever in the clouds with intellectual percep- 
tions but with no spiritual experience. Many 
of them think that intellectuality is spirituality. 
3i 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

They look wise and use high-sounding words, 
and talk about the objective and subjective of 
the inner consciousness, while the starving peo- 
ple say, "How spiritual !" But such men know 
no more of the power of the spiritual life than 
an old maid knows about the reality of a mo- 
ther's love. 

The preaching which draws must not only 
be intelligent and sincere, but it must be an 
outburst of a new life in the soul. Such preach- 
ing fills the pews. A man need not be great or 
learned ; but the preacher should be an interest- 
ing speaker. It is only mental or spiritual lazi- 
ness which makes any preacher dull. While 
we are confident that as a whole no class of men 
are more sincere or work harder; yet laziness 
is the sin of the pulpit, laziness in preparing 
and laziness in preaching — a languid, stupid, 
unemotional delivery. Sometimes it is an ex- 
cess of ministerial dignity. A self-conscious 
manner seems to say, "I am the minister, look 
at me!" When a man simply makes the ser- 
mon a bridge with which to span the Sabbath 



HOW TO FILL THE PBWS 

or a professional performance, people will not 
come to hear him. Young men sometimes say, 
"Oh, give me an opportunity and I can 
preach!" Six people are an opportunity great 
enough for any man. It is not the congrega- 
tion which makes the preacher, but the preacher 
who makes the congregation. A man who 
can not hold a small country congregation 
could not hold one in the city. A man 
who can not increase a country congrega- 
tion could not hold a city audience. Let a 
young man double the congregation at a coun- 
try cross-roads, and a village church will hear 
of it and call him. The secret of failure is not 
little congregations, but little preachers in the 
pulpit. All this may seem harsh, but it is true. 
There are so many churches where there would 
be no congregation but for the few faithful 
people who attend from religious principle. 

A man may not be learned or profound, but 
he can be in earnest. If he can not, then he 
ought to resign. If the people are no less in 
a community, be it country or city, a village or 

33 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

a missionary region; that is, if there are just 
as many people to be reached as there were 
three or five years ago, but the congregation 
is growing less ; that preacher should step out. 
A declining congregation is God's call for a 
man to try some other field. 

The only evidence that God has called a man to 
preach is that he can hold the people. Churches 
and missionary societies are not for the sup- 
port of inefficient men. No matter how good 
a man is, if he can not do the work that needs 
to be done, let him step to one side and another 
have a chance. We repeat, a man need not be 
a great man; but God and the people have a 
right to demand that he be an interesting 
man. 

Since commencing this paper, we have heard 
a man in a fashionable place of resort preach to 
a church full of intelligent people. There was 
not a new thing in the sermon, not a profound 
thing, only as all the gospel is profound. There 
was not a brilliant thing ; the man's voice was 
poor, his theme was common-place, and there 

34 



how to fill run PBWS 

was no display of learning; but from first to 
last one thousand people listened with unfal- 
tering interest, because the man was interest- 
ing. His subject had taken possession of him y 
his mind, his heart, his body, and he preached 
as though the fate of the universe hung upon 
his presentation of the parable of the leper. 

Such preaching people will go to hear. It 
fills the pews. When the minister honors the 
people, the people will honor the service by 
coming. 

A young minister went from a village pas- 
torate to a city church. There came the usual 
question of the evening congregation. He 
was anxious to reach the people upon the 
street. He sent and obtained six pictures il- 
lustrating the "Pilgrim's Progress'' and gave 
six lectures. More people came out. At the 
close of the sixth lecture, he went to his room, 
asking, "What shall I do next? I can not 
keep up this religious show," and a more seri- 
ous night he never spent. The conviction en- 
tered his soul with burning power, "What 
35 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

:am I here for? Is preaching a failure? Is it 
not my business to preach and so to preach 
that people will hear?" Upon his knees he 
resolved he would not give a mere prayer- 
meeting talk or kind of sermonette or a sort 
of lecture, but that he would honor the even- 
ing as the morning, put as much brain, heart, 
and prayer into the evening as into the morn- 
ing; yea, as he wished to reach the outside 
world he would, if anything, put more con- 
secration into the evening than into the morn- 
ing service. A more serious burdened night 
of consecration he never spent. It was a turn- 
ing-point. No more second-place or magic- 
lantern substitutes, but the best he had for the 
evening. Thus, he launched forth. No one 
knew what a travail of soul it cost; but the 
evening congregation commenced to increase 
and became larger than those of the morning; 
the house could not hold the people, and for 
thirty-seven years, the matter of an evening 
audience has settled itself. As a rule, they 
have been larger than those of the morning. 
36 



HOW TO FILL THE PBWS 

As he has filled the pulpit the pews have re- 
sponded. The evening sermons have been born 
of anxiety. He has never entered the pulpit 
without trembling, sometimes almost crawling 
upon his hands and knees into it. There has 
been no attempt at profundity of thought or 
literary finish; but only letting a truth take 
possession of his soul and asking Christ to 
help him send it home into the hearts of those 
who came; and people have come, and out- 
siders have been reached. 

We must not disregard natural law in spir- 
itual life. We must not ignore the natural 
laws of art in Christian work. The truth is 
not enough, the Spirit of God is not enough. 
We must speak the truth in the best manner 
and give the Holy Spirit the best art to use. 
It is the sermon that must fill the pews. The 
humblest country pastor has the finest oppor- 
tunity of any artist in the world. The preach- 
er's duty is to reach the people. That is his 
business. It will cost work and prayer and 
travail of soul, but it is his mission. Not any 
37 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

one can reach all the people, for Christ did 
not; but He was popular, the common people 
heard Him gladly. Reach the people. As Dr. 
Austin Phelps used to say, "Reach the people, 
with classic periods if need be, but reach the 
people; with finished rhetoric, if you can, but 
reach the people." Fill the pews. Here is the 
importance of the preacher being a good 
speaker, and of intensity in the pulpit. 

Good speakers have no difficulty in finding 
pulpits. The pulpits seek them. The men who 
are called from the country to the large vil- 
lages and come from the larger villages to the 
cities, are not called because they are better 
men, more pious, or better educated, or can 
write better sermons, but almost wholly be- 
cause they are better speakers. Our brethren 
in Chicago and Brooklyn who fill the great 
pulpits are not there because they have any 
more spirituality or know any more than the 
rest of us, but because they know how to speak, 
and the reason three-fourths of the ministers 
are compelled to leave their churches in the 
33 



HOW TO FILL THE PBWS 

country, village or city is not because of any- 
thing in their character or culture, but because 
they do not fill the pulpit. 

Nor do good speakers have difficulty in get- 
ting their salary. The people will pay for good 
speaking. The question of the payment of 
the salary is three-fourths of the time in the 
hands of the minister. This does not mean 
that every preacher can be a great preacher — 
a star, nor does it mean that any preacher need 
resort to oratorical — or sensational — or undig- 
nified methods in speech. The people do not 
demand, yea, do not want, such preaching, 
and the men who succeed and rise in the pul- 
pit do not, nine-tenths of them, use such 
methods; but the churches do demand and 
have a right to demand good speaking, and no 
minister has a right to be a dull speaker. His 
art, his business, his duty is not only to preach 
the truth but to so preach it that the people 
will be interested. Dullness in the pulpit with 
all the issues at stake, is wicked. Better say 
one truth so that the people will listen and 

39 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

remember than to say twenty things so that 
they will forget them. In our boyhood we 
had for a pastor a most excellent old minister, 
a graduate of Harvard and who studied under 
Dr. Emmons. The good old man was learned 
and wrote excellent sermons, but he was tame 
as tame could be. In the little village there 
was a Baptist church, and our church and the 
Baptist had no sympathy. One Sunday the 
Baptist minister immersed half a dozen con- 
verts by cutting a hole in the ice. Our good 
old father Davis could not stand that, and the 
next Sunday he preached upon the impro- 
priety of such an act. He woke up, he quite 
shook the pulpit. No eye failed to watch him 
or ear to hear him. When we returned home 
mother said to father : "If Parson Davis loved 
sinners as much as he hates the Baptists, we 
should have some preaching," and it was a just 
criticism. 

Not long ago a cultured deacon in one of 
our larger churches wrote asking about a 
young man who had been recommended to 
40 



HOW TO FILL THE PEWS 

them. We wrote to him that the man was a 
graduate of Yale and Harvard and had spent 
two years across the water, had received his 
A.M. from Yale and his Ph.D. from Har- 
vard and he ought to fill his bill. The deacon 
wrote back : "I don't care a fig for his A.M. 
or his Ph.D. Can he preach?'' 

But the most important of all is intensity 
— intensity of thought, intensity of feeling 
and intensity of manner. There is no great 
power without it. All great speakers have it. 
By intensity is not meant noise, for that may 
be only lung power, or do we mean nervous- 
ness, for that may be only weakness; but we 
mean excitement. No man ever excited others 
who was not himself excited, or roused others 
who was not himself roused. The truth must 
be incarnate in us, we must not only believe 
it but feel it. It must pour out of us and over- 
flow, and not dribble like a little stream from 
a pump where the water is low. Intensity may 
be calm like the movement of a great river, 
but it will be intense all the same. No man 
41 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

ever had power as a speaker who was not in- 
tense, was not excited. Mr. Beecher, the most 
natural, the most graceful, the most eloquent 
pulpit orator of our land, was excited, every 
part if his being, body, mind, heart and soul 
were stirred. Sometimes he was not intense, 
and then he was tame, though his emotions 
were so quickly stirred and his imagination so 
easily caught fire that it was seldom when he 
was not intense, but we heard him give one 
of his most popular lectures where every fiber 
of his being was wrought up and he made us 
cry and laugh as he pleased, and we heard him 
give the same lecture at another time when 
though the thoughts and the words were the 
same it was tame. He remarked to us: "I 
didn't get there tonight." The fire did not 
burn. 

How many of us have heard Richard Storrs 
when it was like the rolling up of Alps, moun- 
tain peak on mountain peak, covered with re- 
splendent imagry, and if you sat close to him 
you saw that every part of his manhood from 



HOW TO FILL THE PBWS 

the top of his head to the end of his toes and 
the tips of his fingers were excited, tremulous 
with intensity and some of us have heard him 
when he was quite as tame as common preach- 
ers — not wrought up, no intensity. Think of 
Phillips Brooks not being intense ! You might 
as well think of Niagara being a stagnant pool. 
Have you not watched him and seen the blood 
rush to his face and his hands tremble as with 
gigantic calmness and gigantic intensity he 
poured forth the convictions and emotions that 
were burning within him ? Call up good Wil- 
liam Taylor. His sermons biblical and prac- 
tical but not great, and yet how people lis- 
tened. You can not think of him as calm in 
the pulpit, just standing still and reading an 
essay. He preached all over and violated all 
the polite rules of elocution by the very in- 
tensity of his manner. John Hall, also the 
incarnation of simplicity of thought, expres- 
sion and of pulpit dignity. His sermons con- 
tained nothing new, original or brilliant, but 
how intense he was, his whole being stirred 
43 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

with spiritual earnestness, speaking as a dying 
man to dying men, and you went from the 
service with your whole spiritual nature 
moved. Dr. George Shepard, Maine's great- 
est preacher, dignified, modest as a bashful 
maiden, reading every word of his sermon, 
but his whole nature so intense with what he 
had to say that he was as a charged battery 
blazing forth his laconic sentences like thun- 
der-bolts, moving his audience as a storm 
moves the trees. Charles H. Spurgeon, every- 
thing considered, the greatest Gospel preacher 
of the last century; his sermons not remark- 
able for their intellectual strength or their 
rhetorical finish — his personal appearance not 
prepossessing, not eloquent like Beecher or 
magnificent like Storrs or grand like Brooks, 
but with a tremendous almost awful spiritual 
intensity, as though the Spirit of God rested 
upon him, and he had a special call on that 
special day to preach that special sermon to 
that special congregation. We sat close to him 
during several sermons and while there was 

44 



HOW TO FILL THE PBWS 

the calmness of self-control, yet every muscle 
of his body quivered and every drop of his 
blood was excited as he talked like a messenger 
from God to six thousand people. There was 
the calmness of self-control, but he was ex- 
cited in every fiber of his being. To use one 
extreme illustration from out of the pulpit, 
Wendell Phillips, the calmest, most dignified, 
most self-possessed and most eloquent reform 
orator of New England. You saw him 
stand and heard him speak to three thou- 
sand people with seemingly no more ex- 
citement than though he was holding a 
quiet conversation with some one man, but 
you sit within three feet of him as it was our 
privilege on two occasions and you discover 
that there was the intensest intensity, his 
whole body a charged battery, not only of 
red-hot thoughts but of burning passion and 
that his whole nature from the top of his head 
to the end of his toes was trembling with emo- 
tion and this pent-up intensity sent his 
thoughts and words like arrows into the heads 

45 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

and hearts of his hearers. No man ever held 
or moved an audience without intensity. There 
must be the burning heart as well as the think- 
ing brain. Every man when he is sincerely 
in love with anything is intense about that 
thing. Dullness, tameness in the pulpit is the 
lack of fire in the heart. We had a young 
visiting friend preach for us. His sermon was 
a correctly, finely written essay, as a literary 
production. After service we walked home 
arm in arm. It was evening and dark. Two 
young men were in front of us. One said to 
the other: "That preacher will be a good 
while dying, won't he?" And that young 
minister thought it strange he did not receive 
a call. A few years ago we attended a large 
convention at a summer resort and in the af- 
ternoon one of the best thinkers from one of 
our largest colleges gave an address which for 
logical construction and beauty of expression 
was one of the highest order, but he delivered 
it as he would have read it to a half dozen 
brethren of the ministry, with not half the 
46 



HOW TO FILL THB PBWS 

earnestness that a schoolgirl talks to her 
schoolmates about a feather in her hat, and as 
a result one-third of the people left before he 
was done. In the evening a young man, a 
stranger from the South, preached. His topic 
was the worth of the soul. He was not learn- 
ed, or cultured. He said nothing new or bril- 
liant, but at once you felt that he was taking 
possession of his subject. He was honesty and 
intensity incarnate. Everybody listened and 
we went home not having heard a new thing, 
but all stirred up and into the night the worth 
of the soul kept oppressing us. As literature 
it did not amount to much, but as a sermon it 
was great. It was spiritual intensity an over- 
flow of the speaker's soul. That is what all 
sermons should be. Dullness in the pulpit is 
wicked. A pulpit on fire will fill the pews. 
When any great truth or fact or love gets pos- 
session of a man he becomes intense. No man 
is tame when he is intense. Years ago af- 
ter church service a little eight - year - old 
child was walking home with us and after 

47 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

quite a while of silence, in the frank, inno- 
cent honesty of a child, she said : "What lots 
of good you would do if you would only wake 
up." Such is what the most of us need to do 
and nowhere more than in the pulpit. Real 
life overflows and no great invention was ever 
made, or great picture painted, or great song 
sung or great sermon preached which was not 
an overflow of an intense soul. 

In reaching the people, remember to whom 
you are preaching. Some ministers do not 
reach the people because they do not preach 
to the people. They prepare such a sermon 
as they think they would like to hear, or, in 
other words, they preach to themselves. They 
forget they are not the people. Other minis- 
ters preach to a select few. They prepare ser- 
mons for Esquire Jones or Doctor Brown or 
Judge Smith or the six or eight most intel- 
lectual people in the congregation, but such 
are not the people. The people are represented 
by the average hearer. Who is the average 
hearer in nineteen out of twenty of all our 



HOW TO FILL THE PEWS 

congregations ? Not the college graduate, not 
the children, but the young man of eighteen, 
he is the average hearer. His mind is an in- 
terrogation point. He is thinking with the 
times, and in the modern way. He represents 
the average intelligence of almost every Sun- 
day audience in the land. Let the preacher 
put himself in the place of an intelligent 
eighteen-year-old young man, and ask, "How 
can I so present the truth as to interest him? 
How can I preach upon the great doctrines so 
as to interest and make them plain to that 
high-school boy or high-school girl?" and 
when you have done that, you have come 
nearest to touching the whole congregation. 
Take as a topic, "Faith," or the "Deity of 
Christ," or the "Atonement," and prepare a 
sermon for an eighteen-year-old young wo- 
man, and the whole audience will listen. 

We have found that our most popular ser- 
mons which have filled the meeting-house in 
the evening have been sermons upon the great 
doctrines, with the young men in view. Young 
49 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

people like to hear great themes presented on 
their line of thinking, and they represent the 
average hearer. Remember who your con- 
gregation are and preach to them and not to 
some ideal audience. Let the deacons go, and 
the old established hearers very much alone; 
they are not the fish you wish to catch. They, 
the most of them, are already caught; but 
cast your net for the young people who are in 
the current and are floating out into life. Take 
great truths and make them plain and give it 
to them red hot from out your own burning 
heart, and the people will come; for the peo- 
ple love to hear men speak, love to hear men 
preach, when they have something to say, and 
know how to say it. But the people nowhere 
will long hear a minister preach who has noth- 
ing to say, nor will they long hear a man 
preach, who, though he has something to say, 
does not know how to say it. Young min- 
isters never had a finer opportunity in the his- 
tory of the church, than at the present time 
to reveal their brains, their skill, their con- 
50 



HOW TO FILL THE PEWS 

secration, and their power as artists for Christ, 
in so preaching that men will come to hear. 
No opportunity for young men in the minis- 
try! God pity him who thinks it. Nowhere 
this side of the eternal mansions is there a 
greater opportunity for the exercise of a man's 
talents, culture, and powers, than in the Chris- 
tian pulpit, preaching Jesus Christ, and Him 
crucified. 

Add to this pulpit power a warm, thought- 
ful love for men as men. Be also a good pas- 
tor. Some ministers are "invisible all the week 
and incomprehensible on Sunday." While the 
pulpit as a means of filling the pews must stand 
first, it should be supplemented by calling Upt- 
on the people, in particular, the non-church- 
going; for when people feel that the minister 
is a personal friend then they enjoy his speak- 
ing all the more. "A family-visiting pastor 
helps to make a church-going people." A man 
who is too intellectual to visit his people, needs 
to come down from the stars and put his feet 
on the ground. A man who does not love to 
51 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

call upon the people has but little Christ in his 
heart. A parish with only a hundred families 
should receive three or four calls a year from 
the pastor ; and these calls will put tenderness 
and sympathy and applications and freshness 
and anxiety into the sermons. Thus as Christ 
and the people fill a man's heart, there will be 
a reality and an unction in his speaking born 
of Christ and moving men's hearts; and the 
preacher will be the representative of the peo- 
ple to Christ and the messenger of Christ to 
the people. 



52 



III. 



OLD YOUNG MINISTERS; OR THE 
DEAD-LINE 

By SMITH BAKER, D.D. 

Old young men are to be seen in every 
department of life, men who have commenced 
to die before they have reached maturity. 
Physically, it is a pitiable sight, a young man 
acting and looking like an old man. Mentally, 
it is a sadder sight, a tree which has ceased to 
grow. Some ministers commence at the dead- 
line. The first dozen sermons they preach 
after graduating are the best they ever preach. 
They are not so interesting after five or ten 
or twenty years as they were when they began. 
They never rise. They always remain small 
men, which in itself is no sin, for some of us 
are born to be small men; we can never be 
great. But though a tree is of the small kind, 
53 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

it may keep fresh and have new branches and 
leaves and blossoms each year; so a preacher 
may not be a great man but he may be a new- 
man each year. 

A rosebush with new leaves and blossoms 
each year is better than a dying oak. As long 
as a man is fresh, he is young. A man never 
reaches the dead-line till he ceases to grow. 
Very many men reach the dead-line in about 
five years. They are never any larger. After 
that, people say, "What a promising young 
minister!" The promise never comes to pass. 
They are no stronger after ten or twenty years 
than they were at the end of five years. That 
time measures their limit, then they strike the 
dead-line. They are generally men of harm- 
less character, what are called consistent men 
in their lines, men of considerable ministerial 
dignity and propriety of manner who pass for 
rather pious men — somewhat active in the 
little things of the ministry, rarely indiscreet ; 
they never grow and their lives are spent in 
pastorates of from three to five years. 
54 



THB DBAD LINE 

We know a man whose ministry was over 
forty years in eight pastorates, and his largest 
were his first two, a man of fine health and 
of fine advantages; but a friend who was in 
the family during the last pastorate said, the 
name of each church where he had lived was 
upon nearly all the sermons he preached. He 
struck the dead-line at the end of his first pas- 
torate, for when a man commences to preach 
his old sermons, just as he first prepared them, 
he has become an old young man; he has 
reached the dead-line; he belongs to the past. 
He who preaches old sermons to save work 
has commenced to wither. A man may use 
the same text, and the same topic, and the 
same arguments, and quite the same illustra- 
tions, but when he simply repeats the old ser- 
mon, it is like a last-year's bird's nest. A 
minister has a right to use the same text and 
same subject but it must be a new sermon, 
born anew in the heart and brain of the 
preacher, just as a tree is a new tree each 
spring though the trunk, branches, and roots 
are mostly the same. 

55 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

The mere using an old sermon to save 
thought and time, is laziness and has been the 
abomination and failure of hundreds of 
preachers. To work over and make over an 
old sermon is proper and at times a duty and 
has frequently given to the world the greatest 
sermons. The great preachers all do it, but 
the sermon is a new sermon each time, born 
again whenever preached. Whitefield re- 
peated his sermons in that sense, but they were 
new and fresh each time, yea, newer and 
fresher each time because they had grown in 
his brain and heart. 

Edward Everett's great oration upon Wash- 
ington, which he delivered more than one hun- 
dred and forty times in the principal cities of 
the United States and which was considered 
the most finished of all American orations and 
which passed for the same lecture each time, 
was never delivered twice alike. Though the 
theme was the same, the ideas the same, and 
the illustrations the same, the words were 
never quite the same. In his own soul it was 
56 



THE DEAD LINE 

a new oration each time, born again upon each 
occasion. Thus with every true orator as a 
preacher. 

Nothing else will sooner dry up a preacher 
as a thinker or speaker than to merely repeat 
old sermons. It will bring the dead-line to 
any man. No minister can merely repeat an 
old sermon with power, for it is then only a 
recitation, a rhetorical performance. The ser- 
mon must be reborn in the preacher's mind 
and heart or it will lose its power. When a 
tree ceases to reproduce it has commenced to 
die. It has struck the dead-line. How many 
teachers and college professors always remain 
little teachers because they only repeat the 
same lessons year after year. 

The preacher must constantly reproduce and 
create in order to grow and keep young. 
Hence, as a rule, the great preachers have had 
long pastorates, because the long pastorate has 
compelled constant reproduction. 

At any rate, while a man ought to use his 
past preparation in preparing his sermons, he 
57 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

is never to fall back upon such preparation as 
a substitute for work and anxiety. John B. 
Gough repeated his lectures over and over, 
but, as he told me, they were new lectures each 
time; the thoughts were the same, but they 
were new in the way he presented them and 
new each time in the anxiety of his heart. 

Here is the temptation of written sermons. 
While it is a man's privilege and duty to use 
a full written manuscript, if he can preach bet- 
ter that way — for remember there is a vast 
difference between reading and preaching — 
here is a temptation to feel, "Well, it is all 
written out, and I have nothing to be anxious 
for, and I can draw it out any time, it is all 
ready." Hence the dullness of much of the 
old New England preaching was simply the 
reading of an old production, not preaching at 
all. If a man uses an old manuscript of an 
old sermon, he must preach it as a new one. 
It must be new in his soul, if not in his brain. 
Some ministers reach the "dead-line" young 
because after a while the act of preaching be- 
5» 



THE DEAD LINE 

comes more easy and they lose their anxiety. 
When a man loses his anxiety as a speaker, 
he has commenced to wither ; he loses his emo- 
tion, his fire, his power is gone. When there 
is no "wake-up" in the preacher, there will be 
no waking up in the congregation. 

Only mental and spiritual egotism is un- 
anxious when about to preach. The humble, 
modest, sincere man, no matter how great his 
ability or culture, always trembles when he 
enters the pulpit. There is a spiritual dread 
before preaching which gives power in speak- 
ing. Because a man appears to speak easy is 
no sign his knees do not tremble. The bravest 
soldiers turn pale when they enter battle. Only 
the superficial man commences to preach with- 
out a burden upon his heart. Self-trust is an 
approach to the dead-line with a minister. 

Again, some men reach the dead-line be- 
cause they fall into professional ruts. They 
are mechanical and have the same way of do- 
ing anything, any time. They form a habit 
of reading or speaking or composing sermons, 
59 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

and their work is like hand-organ music. They 
read every hymn in the same manner, read 
all Scripture in the same tone, make the same 
prayer over and over, construct their sermons 
on the same plan, and deliver them in the same 
mechanical way. It becomes tiresome to the 
people. 

The first time you hear some men, you say, 
"How fine!" but the second and third time it 
is the same, and in a while it becomes dull for 
the want of variety. Ministers who would 
keep young and retain their power must look 
out for ministerial ruts. Men fall into a same- 
ness of manner all unconscious to themselves, 
but the people can tell beforehand just what is 
coming next in the prayer, and how far the 
minister is in his sermon, for everything is 
cast in the same mechanical form. 

Music and painting and all art is in the 
unity of variety, much more is this true in 
public speaking. A good housewife in pre- 
paring the daily meals has very much the same 
material to work with, month after month, but 
60 



THE DEAD LINE 

she has an endless variety in the way she puts 
the food on the table. The potatoes and the 
meat are prepared in all sorts of ways, so that 
though they are the same kind of potatoes and 
meat they are served differently. Thus the 
minister who would keep off the dead-line 
must study variety in his methods and in 
preaching even the same old Gospel. Look 
out for sameness, for it revolves round the 
dead line. 

Some ministers reach the dead-line because 
they do not study and study hard and think 
and think hard. Preaching is not easy work. 
The last place in the world for a lazy man is the 
modern pulpit. Light reading, light study, 
and light thinking w T ill make light preaching. 
The muscles never increase in strength with- 
out hard exercise — neither will the mind. 

To feed the body upon "consomme" soup 
and angel cake and ice-cream will not make a 
giant. Light reading will not make strong 
thinking. The mind does not become strong 
of itself without strong food. There must be 

61 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

hard work in the study or the brain will fall 
back, at least, never increase in power. 

A preacher to hold his own with the con- 
gregation must more than hold his own in his 
ability. That is, a man to preach as well to 
the same congregation at the end of three 
years must all the time preach better. When 
he ceases to grow he touches the dead-line. 

His reading must not only mean hard read- 
ing, which makes the brain tired, but it must 
be various reading. While the minister is to 
be a man of "one Book," no other profession 
calls for such a variety of reading. Without 
that there will be a sameness in his illustra- 
tions and a narrowness in his thinking. A 
minister should read a little of everything that 
is fit to be read, from children's stories to the 
profoundest discussions in philosophy; not 
only exegesis and theology, but history, 
science, art, poetry, biography, politics, ethics, 
and fiction. Not that the minister is to be 
learned in all these or in many of them, but 
he should be more or less intelligent in them 
62 



THE DEAD LINE 

all. To read only on one or two subjects has 
a tendency to make a man one-sided and par- 
tial in his thinking, as to look at one side of 
a mountain gives one a very limited view of 
the mountain. A pond into which nothing 
runs will soon run dry, so the mind into which 
something is not constantly pouring will run 
dry, and that is why so many preachers after 
a while become in their sermons as dry as dust. 
The freshness and sweetness of the lakes is 
that there are hundreds of little streams from 
the hillsides constantly flowing into them. 
Thus a variety of reading keeps the mind 
fresh. 

Mr. Gladstone was one of the most remark- 
able illustrations of this truth in public life. 
He was, first of all, a statesman. Around that 
his energies were concentrated, but it was his 
habit to keep four or five books upon as many 
subjects upon his table all the time and to read 
a little from each and every day, and thus as 
with no other great man of the last century, 
he was not only intelligent but quite an au- 
63 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

thority in science and art and literature and 
theology. This variety of information not 
only made him a broader, more rounded man, 
but it increased his strength as a stateman and 
enriched his oratory as a politician. The most 
of our public men are sharp and smart but 
narrow. 

We once invited a distinguished United 
States Senator to give a week-day lecture to 
our young people, upon any secular theme he 
chose. His reply was that it would give him 
great pleasure to do so, but he must confess 
that he had "not read up on anything but 
politics and cattle shows." The preacher can 
not afford to be in his intelligence only a min- 
ister. Read constantly and variously and 
though one may not be a scholar in other than 
the Bible, yet his constant reading a variety, 
even of that which seems to have the least 
connection with his profession, will appro- 
priate to itself freshness of illustration and 
breadth of thinking. 

We call to mind a good man of more than 
64 



THE DEAD hll 

common natural ability who had received the 
usual course of education for the ministry and 
who upon special occasions was capable of 
eloquent speech, but who never remained more 
than four years in the same place. Visiting 
his home, we found that after forty years in 
the ministry his library consisted of less than 
one hundred books. He had not fed his mind 
and hence reached the dead-line before he was 
thirty. And this was not because he had no 
money with which to buy a book now and 
then, for upon a small salary he had succeeded 
in having several thousand dollars at interest. 
He had chosen to fill his pocket rather than 
his brain and had his reward. He was by 
natural gift a strong man, but by neglect he 
became a weak man. 

We were well acquainted with another min- 
ister who was for forty-nine years pastor of 
the same church in an intelligent town. He 
had not near the natural talent of the other 
man and no better preparation, but in the 
y-fifth year of his pastorate, one c ' 
65 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

best educated hearers remarked that his ser- 
mons were fresher and more interesting than 
they were forty years before. We frequently 
visited his home and generally found some 
new book and his library had something in it 
upon a variety of subjects. He had no more 
income than the other man but he put a part 
of his limited income into his brains and as a 
result he never reached the dead line, not even 
in the forty-ninth year of his ministry, when 
God called him to his reward. 

We know how difficult it is for a missionary 
with a small salary to furnish himself with 
books. We have been there. But when there 
is a will there is a way, and in case a minister 
is so situated that he has no money for books, 
as doubtless there are such cases, let him bor- 
row them. In these days and in the most 
obscure parish, books and magazines are pres- 
ent. The book and magazine are almost om- 
nipresent. "Uncle Sam's" post-office sends 
them into every nook and corner of our vast 
domain, and though the books that a man finds 
U 



THE DEAD LINE 

in the homes of his people may not be relig- 
ious or seem to have anything to do with ser- 
mons, let him borrow them and read them. 
The seemingly most unlikely book will fre- 
quently suggest the best thoughts. Many a 
good sermon has been born from a book which 
had no religion in it. One of the best sermons 
the writer ever preached was suggested and 
filled with illustrations from a little book upon 
"Bee Culture." 

If you can not find what you want to read, 
then read what you can find. Keep the streams 
flowing into the mind. Read what you can 
get and if you are an honest man, God will 
help you to use it. You may not see many 
new books, but an old book is new when the 
mind is hungry. He who starves his brain 
will soon reach the dead-line. On the other 
hand, he who reads and keeps on reading, like 
the man who travels and thinks while he 
travels will constantly have new thoughts 
come to him and new illustrations with which 
to clothe his old thoughts; in other words, he 
will keep young. 

67 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

Another reason why some ministers reach 
the dead-line so soon is quite like the last. 
They trust to the naturally increasing facility 
of thought and expression. Because they can 
think easier and talk easier, they mistake that 
for growth in ability while in many instances 
it becomes a decline in strength. Facility of 
expression is frequently one of the greatest 
temptations to mental and spiritual idleness. 
The easier a man can talk the more he needs 
to study or his speech will become but a rat- 
tling of words. Even fluency in prayer is a 
temptation to the use of words without ideas, 
and some of what are called the most gifted 
prayers contain the least thought. With an 
increasing ease in expression there is the temp- 
tation to mere professionalism and w 
words and only words, are a substitute for 
work and thought. 

Trusting to one's gifts or to the inspiration 

of the occasion is an insult to the truth, the 

people, and to God. When a minister by 

some special providence is prevented from 

68 



THE DEAD LINE 

preparing a sermon till Sunday morning then 
he has a right to trust in God and proceed; 
and if he is a true minister, God will give him 
special aid. But when a man neglects to pre- 
pare himself and through pure indolence goes 
in for a purely extemporaneous sermon, then 
he disgraces the profession. It is not faith, 
but spiritual egotism which a man may ex- 
ercise for a few times, but soon it becomes to 
the hearers as the same "old song,'' and the 
minister all unconscious to himself, passes the 
dead-line and then wonders why people do not 
come to hear him. 

Fluency is not power, it is apt to be weak- 
ness, no better expressed than in the words of 
great Dr. George Shepherd, who said, "Some 
men go into the pulpit trusting to the inspira- 
tion of the hour, thinking they are but little 
below the angels and come out of it little above 
asses.'' While we are to trust in the Holy 
Spirit as though all depended upon Him, we 
are to give Him the best we can to work with 
and use. 

69 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

The prophet called down fire upon the altar 
but he collected an abundance of wood and ar- 
ranged it in the best manner before he called 
upon God. Faith is no substitute for work 
in preaching any more than in raising corn. 

We must look out that ease of expression 
does not take the place of ideas. Utterance 
is a great thing but to have something to utter 
is greater. When a man is simply a talker and 
has ceased to instruct and awaken thought, 
there he has come to the dead-line. 

Some ministers come to the dead-line be- 
cause they lose their physical earnestness. 
There is an unconscious physical energy about 
a healthy young man which is a power in it- 
self, which calls and holds attention, and to 
an extent impresses the truth. This fact is 
not to be forgotten. There is the physical ele- 
ment in public speaking and nowhere more 
than preaching. Beecher, Spurgeon and Brooks 
were all examples of this. Their physical vi- 
tality had no small part to do with their power 
over an audience, and that physical vitality 
70 



THE DEAD LINE 

continued with them almost to the last. They 
seemed like young men when in their maturity. 
When a man preaches as if it was hard work, 
or as if he was tired or weak, then he has 
come to the dead-line. A rested body and rest- 
ed nerves; these are necessary to good work 
in the pulpit. When a minister continues to 
go into the pulpit with tired nerves so that 
there is no energy left in him, and his body 
does not wake up with his mind and his blood 
is not stirred with his heart, then his power 
will decline. 

We do not put this as first, but it is true 
that many a minister comes to the dead-line 
at fifty because he has lost his physical energy. 
There may be the old fire in his thoughts, but 
there is no fire in his utterance. No man needs 
more to keep young in his physical nature than 
the preacher, for the body is not only the tem- 
ple of the Holy Spirit, but the instrument of 
the Holy Spirit in public speech. Here is an 
unconscious thing. We older men do not 
realize our loss of energy in the pulpit. We 
71 



THE MASTER PROFESSIOX 

think we are speaking as earnestly, as intense- 
ly as ever, but we are not. We unconsciously 
lose our fire. This is excusable in a man over 
seventy, but excuseless in a minister under that 
age. When the physical vitality commences 
to wane, then the dead-line is coming. 

The churches call for young ministers not 
because the young ministers are wiser or 
preach better sermons, but because they have 
more energy and physical vitality. When a 
man keeps up his magnetic force, that is, keeps 
his nervous energy young, then the church en- 
joys him at threescore years and ten. Look- 
out for an unconscious calmness, a lack of 
fire, and a resting upon what one has done in 
the past. Past success will not satisfy the peo- 
ple. When a man, because he used to do it, 
thinks there is no need of special effort now, 
he has come to the dead-line. When a man 
acts tired in the pulpit, then his dead-line has 
come. He needs either to take a vacation or 
resign. 

The dead-line comes when a minister loses 
72 



THE DEAD LINE 

his social sympathies. The preacher can not 
afford to grow old in his heart, and if he is 
right he will not. Some preachers soon seem 
to lose their interest in young people and con- 
fine their associations to the older people. The 
young people do not feel acquainted with them. 
A minister should not be boyish, but he should 
be a boy to the end of life. Youthfulness in 
an old minister is what fresh leaves are each 
year to an old tree. Some young ministers 
seem to think that being a minister classes 
them with the old people. 

Rev. Dr. David Thurston, of Maine, a cul- 
tured minister of the old school, dignified and 
fastidious in his manners, preached till he was 
eighty-four, and after he was eighty-four he 
used to attend the debating societies of the 
young people, that, as he said, he might keep 
in touch with them, know what they were think- 
ing about, and how they looked at questions. 

Keep up with the young people. They will 
suggest more fresh thoughts, and reveal more 
of real, living human nature than any other 
73 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

class. He who takes particular pains to de- 
velop the spiritual life of his young people 
will find his own spiritual life quickened, and 
his heart will keep young. A minister misses 
one of the greatest blessings to his own life 
as well as lessens his own influence when he 
loses touch with the young. He who is no 
longer a boy in his heart has touched the 
dead-line. 

Then, also, not only with the young, but 
with society. Some ministers, as the years 
pass on, draw themselves more and more with- 
in themselves and take no interest in anything 
but their sermons and a few friends. They 
are good, sincere, pious men; but as the ex- 
pression is sometimes used, "they are too 
pious," too other-worldly, and become more 
and more exclusively ministerial, losing their 
touch with common life. While the preacher 
can not be too spiritual, he is also to be in- 
tensely human ; for not in the Roman Catholic 
sense, but in the true Christian sense, he is to 
be the spiritual brother and father of all his 

74 



THE DEAD LINE 

congregation, old and young. All other things 
being equal, the strength and permanence of 
a pastor's service will depend upon how much 
the people feel he has a personal affection for 
each and all of them. This must be no patron- 
izing thing, but real for all, and, in particular, 
for the poor and those who are not positively 
religious. The worst of men appreciate per- 
sonal love and attention, and this personal at- 
tention, when it has been impartial, has won 
many a man upon whom the preaching made 
no impression. Many a minister has had a 
long and useful pastorate when his sermons 
have been very ordinary, all because of his 
warm-hearted faithfulness as a pastor. 

As a member of a large number of councils 
called to dismiss short pastorates, we have 
found that in more than one-half of them the 
occasions for short pastorates have been lack 
of wise management and good sense as pas- 
tors. Want of common-sense brings the dead- 
line. Wise, cautious, unselfish, charitable, pa- 
tient, impartial, and affectionate leadership 

75 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

keeps a minister young in the hearts of his 
people, as well as young in his own heart. 

On the other hand, some ministers reach the 
dead-line for want of piety. People, even 
those not Christians, soon lose their respect 
for a merely worldly and social minister, one 
who has no spiritual earnestness. Such an 
one may please by his social qualities or by 
his pulpit smartness for a while, but a strong, 
lasting hold upon the confidence, respect, and 
love of a people can only be secured by real 
piety. 

Smartness has its transient power, a fine 
personal appearance will have a short-lived in- 
fluence and a "hail-fellow well-met" will take 
among the unthinking for a season, but only 
downright serious, realness of Christian char- 
acter grows stronger in its influence as the 
years roll on. So far as influence of char- 
acter is concerned there is no dead-line in the 
life of a sincere spiritual man, but every year, 
to such an one, adds power to his words. 
A minister whose spirituality the world can 
76 



THE DEAD LINE 

not respect ought to reach the dead-line before 
he is ordained. 

And this leads to the last reason why some 
ministers reach the dead-line so soon, because 
they lose spiritual intensity in their preaching. 
This is one of the most subtle temptations in 
the ministry, that of preaching becoming mere- 
ly professional. Spiritual earnestness is one 
of the greatest powers in the preacher. It 
gives a sermon of little or common mental 
strength great attractiveness and force. A 
minister upon whom the burden of souls rests 
as a passion is never dull; but the very fre- 
quency of preaching has a tendency to deaden 
this intensity unless there is an increasing spir- 
itual life in the soul. There is no other form 
of speech so attractive as spiritual earnestness 
on fire. This more than education or culture, 
yea, rather with education, has been the great 
secret of the power of the great preachers — 
St. Francis, Luther, Knox, Wesley, Edwards. 
Spurgeon, and Brooks — this is also true with 
common preachers. 

77 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

When the minister's spiritual life becomes 
cold, his pulpit power declines. Culture can 
not take the place of it. As soon as the 
preacher's spiritual earnestness commences to 
decline, then he approaches the dead-line; but 
as long as he is "dead in earnest" for souls 
and his heart is on fire with love to Christ, 
the people will enjoy hearing him. No matter 
how many years a man has preached, if he is 
filled with a "travail for souls/' he will be 
young in the pulpit. This lack of spiritual 
anxiety is the greatest secret of short pastor- 
ates. When preaching becomes merely intellec- 
tual, formal, cold, with no unction, then as a 
result it does not touch the spiritual wants of 
the people, and loses its power. The longer 
a man preaches, the more each Sunday he 
needs to have his lips touched as with a live 
coal from God's altar. To preach as a dying 
man to dying men gives power and freshness. 

Such a minister may be feeble in body and 
old in years, but he is young in love and pas- 
sion, and the dead-line is still before him. 
78 



THE DEAD LINE 

Other things being equal, mental laziness and 
spiritual coldness are the makers of the dead- 
line. A mind constantly taking in and a soul 
on fire with love to Christ will keep a man 
fresh in thought and young in heart and full 
of power, after the hair is white and the steps 
are slow. Such a man only reaches the dead- 
line at death. Complete consecration is a con- 
stant renewal of strength and power. They 
who are moved by the powers of an endless 
life shall renew their strength to the last: 



79 



IV. 

WHY, IF I WERE TO LIVE MY LIFE 
OVER AGAIN, I WOULD ENTER 
THE MINISTRY— A TESTI- 
MONY OF EXPERIENCE 

By SMITH BAKER, D.D. 

After quite fifty years as preacher and pastor 
in country, village and city, there comes an in- 
creasing conviction that were I permitted to 
live my life over, I would choose the ministry 
above all other professions. The following 
are some of the reasons, which come to me as 
I look over the past : 

First, it is not safe to disregard the call of 
God. He who does it never succeeds in the 
end. 

Second, the financial comfort. This will 
seem strange to many people, and I do not 
think it would he a consideration of any great 
81 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

importance to any spiritual man; for a min- 
ister who has not faith enough to trust God 
and the church for his support has not faith 
enough to preach faith to the people. The 
financial consideration is in reality beneath the 
dignity of a serious consideration from any 
God-called man, and the vast majority of suc- 
cessful ministers have not allowed it to influ- 
ence them in their decisions. But in looking 
back over the fifty years, I have observed and 
experienced that whether upon five hundred 
or five thousand dollars salary, no class of men 
live more at ease, with more than an average of 
the people, or are surrounded with more of the 
refinements of life, or suffer less for the necessi- 
ties, or educate their children better, or come to 
old age in more comfortable circumstances 
than ministers. Of course, there are excep- 
tions, but not so many or great as in any 
other profession. Ministers do not have as 
much as the richest of their people, nor are 
they required to live as the poorest, but for the 
comfortables of life, no class of men are better 
situated. 

82 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

Third, a delightful memory, which comes as 
a motive to choose the same profession, is the 
superior intellectual privileges which attend it. 
No other profession compels so large or varied 
a mental life. The lawyer, the physician and 
the college professor are by the special limita- 
tions of their work, confined to a narrower 
range of reading and thinking. The preacher, 
from the very necessity of his work, in prepar- 
ing two discourses each week for the same 
congregation composed of every variety of 
persons, old and young, cultured and uncul- 
tured, serious and unserious, is compelled to 
read more extensively and upon a greater va- 
riety of subjects that he may adapt and illus- 
trate his theme to all the extremes of mental 
life in the congregation. Hence if you wish to 
secure a course of secular lectures for a com- 
mon congregation, you will find more minis- 
ters able to respond to such an invitation than 
can be found in any other profession. This 
constant intercourse with the best minds of 
the past upon all kinds of subjects — religious, 

S3 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

social, philosophical, scientific, historical, and 
literary — becomes an increasing and absorbing 
delight, and is like so many streams of pleas- 
ure flowing into the mind, a constant source 
of enjoyment so that the minister's study fre- 
quently becomes an intellectual banquet-hall 
where he feasts upon the best thoughts of the 
the best minds of all ages, and sometimes he 
would like to remain there forever. Such is one 
of the natural perquisities of the ministry, the 
memory of which is a sweet song. 

Fourth, another motive for choosing the 
same form of life is that of its high social 
character. The best society is open to the true 
pastor. If there are any intelligent, high- 
minded, noble men or cultured, refined, sweet- 
souled, consecrated women in the community, 
the pastor has free welcome to their society, 
and by the very nature of his office is brought 
into association and fellowship with them. No 
other person is so constantly in touch with the 
best-thinking, the best culture, the highest 
ideas and the noblest living in society as the 

84 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

Christian minister. The memory of such asso- 
cations with good and true men and women 
and their influence upon his own life are a long 
and delightful picture-gallery into which he 
looks with gladness in his soul. 

Fifth, another motive for entering the same 
life is the opportunity of ministering to the 
poor, the sad, the unfortunate, the discouraged 
and the young. At first, these things do not 
always seem a joy. They look disagreeable, 
and frequently the minister dreads them; but 
every faithful pastor soon learns that some of 
the sweetest songs which have come into his 
heart have been after making calls which he 
dreaded to make. Yea, some of the most pain- 
ful things in the minister's life make him most 
glad in his heart when they are done. He 
who turns away from a disagreeable duty 
loses a great blessing. Even when one has 
seemed to fail in helping or giving comfort, 
the very attempt, when prayerfully made, has 
brought the joy of God into the soul. Things 
which others call the most unwelcome duties 
85 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

of the minister's life, are frequently the richest 
in their rewards upon his own character and 
wake up the most precious memories in after- 
years. Ah, the drudgery of the ministry! God 
pity such a man. He has never entered into 
sympathy with Christ or understood the mis- 
sion of our Lord, or realized that in the spir- 
itual life, as in nature, the sweetest flowers 
bloom in the most unlikely places. 

Sixth, another memory, which causes one 
to wish the same life again, is the association 
with good men in their plans and works for 
the Redeemer's kingdom. There are no 
sweeter, purer, or stronger friendships than 
such. To meet once a month with a body 
of consecrated Christian men, whose hearts 
beat as one heart in love for the Church, and 
spend the evening in prayer and conversation 
about the prosperity of Christ's kingdom, is 
like lovers planning together for the pros- 
perity of their home. Such men's hearts melt 
in together, they become like young brothers 
about a common fireside, and as the years roll 
86 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

away, the momory of such seasons are among 
the solid satisfactions which fill the soul, caus- 
ing the communion of Christ and His disciples 
to be more real to the heart. 

Seventh, another memory, which makes one 
wish to live the same life is the joy of preach- 
ing. No other exhilaration or intoxication is 
equal to it. When a man's heart is full of the 
love of Christ, and of souls, and the truth takes 
possession of him, then to preach thrills the 
body, blood, nerves, mind, heart, soul and 
spirit. Public speaking is the greatest of all 
arts, and preaching is the highest form of pub- 
lic speaking, which brings into action every 
part of one's nature, physical, mental, moral, 
social and spiritual. Yea, when the Spirit of 
God uses one, then to the preacher, at least, 
the day of Pentecost returns with its baptism 
of joy. There is no excitement of the whole 
man deeper, higher, purer, or more intense, 
so that one would wish to preach every day 
in the year for ten thousand years. No world- 
ly pleasure can equal that of the pulpit. The 
87 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

true preacher makes no sacrifice in preaching. 
It is a sacrifice for him not to preach, and he 
looks back upon his sermons, however com- 
monplace in construction, as mountain heaps 
of joy, when the Spirit of God has thrilled his 
soul. God pity the minister to whom preach- 
ing is cold duty, a mere intellectual perfor- 
mance, a matter only of instruction, or a rhet- 
orical art. Such an one knows nothing of 
what it is to be on the mount with Christ. 
The true minister soon learns to understand 
how the old-time preachers with no thought 
of pay or home, loved to go from place to 
place, proclaiming the gospel of glad tidings. 
Oh, the unutterable joy of preaching! One 
would like to do it forever. 

Eighth. The greatest joy a true woman 
has is when she kisses the new-born child God 
has given her. Akin to that is the joy of the 
pastor over souls he had led to Christ. Roll 
up all earthly joys together and the joy of the 
pastor over a new-born soul in Christ exceeds 
them all. To teach others the way of life, 
8S 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

to pray for them, to be anxious for them,, 
and to see them come into the light and joy 
of salvation, brings the heart into knowledge 
of the meaning of the words of Christ : "There 
is joy among the angels in heaven over one 
sinner that repenteth." This is the highest 
pinnacle of the pastor's joy. The applause of 
an audience, the congratulation of friends, the 
memory of deeds done, are small compared to 
that of soul-saving. It wakes up more halle- 
lujahs in the heart than any other one thing 
this side of the heavenly mansion. It is re- 
ward enough for all hard work, for all trials, 
for all seeming sacrifices. It is that which 
brings one into completest union with Christ. 
No man called of God makes any sacrifice in 
entering the gospel ministry. Such are some 
of the blessings which come to even a common 
minister during the years of his active service, 
and which fill his heart with blessed memories 
when the pastorate is given up. 

Ninth. Again, when to quite half a cen- 
tury of pastorate ended, there come the un- 
s 9 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

expected revelations of things concerning 
which he was unconscious at the time, these 
form a new motive for wishing to live over 
the same life. This unconscious fruitage con- 
stantly springing up paints the sunset skies 
with golden hues. During the last years, the 
afternoon and the evening are full of light. 
We note a few of these revelations. We give 
them not for any egotistical reason, but as ex- 
periences which have come to a common pas- 
tor, and which may comfort some man still 
working amid seeming discouragements, and 
which also may cause some young man to feel 
as never before the blessedness of the gospel 
ministry. 

The writer recently passing through one of 
the great cities on the Pacific coast and regis- 
tering his name in a leading hotel, was ap- 
proached by the proprietor in a most cordial 
greeting, saying: "I am the proprietor of 
this house, and it is a great pleasure to wel- 
come you as my guest. Twenty-five years ago, 
I passed through the city where you were pa§- 
90 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

tor, and went to your evening service ; your 
changed my whole life. From that night I 
have lived with a new purpose. I must enter- 
tain you as my guest." 

On the same journey, coming over the high 
mountains, a gentleman introduced himself, 
saying: "You do not know me. You never 
saw me but once, and then as a stranger you 
said you hoped that I was a Christian. I was 
not then, but your kind words touched me, and 
as I came into this far West, they troubled 
me till I gave my heart to Christ. I want to 
thank you." 

At a great convention in the Middle States, 
after speaking, a man introduced himself, say- 
ing: "I never saw you before, but I have a 
message from my daughter who was once a 
member of your congregation in the far East, 
and after coming to the West, a sermon of 
yours which she heard troubled her until she 
confessed Christ. Three years ago she died, 
and her dying request was that if I ever saw 
you I would tell you of her hope and her 
91 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

joyful death, and I have come ten miles this 
morning to give the message." 

Since the writer's resignation, a few months 
ago, a letter from a distant part of our land 
came, saying: "You have forgotten me, but 
forty years ago I was a lad in your congrega- 
tion, and when I left to find a home in the 
mountains you made me promise to lead a 
Christian life. I promised, but confess I did 
not mean it. The promise, however, kept com- 
ing up, and years ago I found Christ. Notic- 
ing in the paper your resignation, I felt that I 
must let you know that the words spoken to 
a lad whom you had forgotten were not lost." 

Forty-five years ago, walking in my parish 
one morning, I met a little barefooted, ragged 
miss with freckled face and uncombed hair, 
who had mayflowers to sell. I bought a 
bunch, and giving her a little picture-card, I 
asked if she went to Sunday-school. Her 
quick response was, "No. Got no clothes fit." 
I said, "Wear your day-school clothes. You 
go to day-school, don't you?" She replied, 
92 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

"Hain't no good for Sunday." "Yes, they 
are; come to our Sunday-school next Sab- 
bath." "Folks proud up there. Don't want 
me." "Yes, they do ; come in your day-school 
clothes and I will give you a book." She an- 
swered, "Perhaps." I had no thought she 
would come, but she did. She was introduced 
to a teacher who received her warmly, and 
though her clothes were almost shabby com- 
pared with the other girls in the class, she con- 
tinued to come. Her home was one of the 
poorest, most shiftless and unworthy in the 
community. After a few months, she came 
and said she wanted to join the church. I 
was convinced that she had found the Savior, 
and was trying to lead a Christian life, but she 
was only twelve, and from a wretched family. 
A part of the deacons said, if we receive her 
we shall have trouble with her in a few years. 
\Ye decided, however, that she was Christ's 
child and we had no right to reject her. She 
came into the Church. In less than a year, the 
roving family moved into a distant part of the 

93 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

State, and soon moved again, and all track was 
lost of them. Many times I wondered what 
became of the little barefooted Jenny, and pre- 
sumed that with her environment, she had gone 
into evil. Three years ago, after the evening 
service, in the city where I then preached, when 
the people had mostly retired, a richly-dressed, 
fine-appearing woman came, and presenting her 
hand, gave a cordial greeting. Upon confessing 
that she had the advantage of me, she said : 
"Don't you remember Jenny, who sold you some 
mayflowers a long time ago ?" I did not at first, 
but soon it dawned upon me. I could not 
conceal my amazement, and said, "Tell me 
about these years." The story was that she 
had worked her way to an education, married 
a fine husband, who had become a man of 
wealth, had five children, all of whom were in 
the church, and she had just been to Smith's 
College, where her eldest daughter graduated. 
With most gracious tones, she said, "It's all 
owing to the bunch of mayflowers you bought 
of me forty-five years ago." I went home 
94 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

thinking, forty-five years ago a poor, ragged 
girl, now a Christian mother with five Chris- 
tian children, and one just graduated from col- 
lege, great pay for a kind word to a poor girl. 

Years ago, working on a small salary among 
mostly poor people, the majority of the men 
having no interest in religious matters, I was 
taken sick, and was dangerously ill for almost 
two months, at great cost for a special nurse, 
and for one and a part of the time for two 
physicians, who came from a distance. The 
salary was less than fifty dollars a month, and 
when the danger was past, and the friends 
could call, the good deacon of the church came, 
and offering congratulations, threw a bundle 
of money into my lap saying: "Your bills 
are all paid." I felt that the church was not 
able to do it, and remonstrated that I could 
not take it. His quick answer was: "Not a 
cent has come from the church, but the men 
who do not go to church sent this to you, ask- 
ing you to accept, for they said that you had 
been having a tremendous hard time, and had 
95 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

been trying to make their boys and girls bet- 
ter, and they had never helped you, and now 
they claimed the privilege of paying your 
bills." The most of these men were profane 
and seemingly regardless of all religion, but 
they appreciated work done for their homes. 
•God and the people can be trusted. 

Thus page after page might be written of 
illustrations of unexpected recognition of work- 
done, but I am inclined to close with extracts 
from a few of several hundred letters received 
from all over the country since my resignation, 
and these extracts from the unexpected 
sources : 

A merchant in a distant city, who was a 
lad in my early ministry, writes : "You have 
resigned. God bless you. All I am, or have, 
or hope to be, I owe to you." 

Another : "You were the means, years ago. 
of uniting our whole family, both as a family 
and to the church. You did not realize it." 

Another: "You must not leave the minis- 
try without knowing how much, years ago, 
96 



A TESTIMONY OF EXPERIENCE 

you comforted us in our troubles, and helped 
us in the Christian life." 

Another: " Allow one you have forgotten 
to confess what help you were to us in our sor- 
rows years ago." 

Another: "You do not remember me, or 
the words you said, but twenty years ago you 
started me in the Christian life." 

Another: "I hear you have resigned. I 
want to thank you for what you did for my 
children years ago when they were boys." 

Another : "Though a generation has passed 
since I have seen you, my boy has not got 
over the influence of your words." 

Another : "I did not agree with all of your 
preaching when you were our pastor, but I 
can not let your ministerial life close without 
thanking you for the high ideals of life you 
gave our children. They have never forgotten, 
them." 

Another : "While your people are doubtless; 
saying pleasant things of you, allow one who 
was a seemingly thoughtless little boy years 
97 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

ago, to thank you because I never got away 
from your words until I came to Christ." 

Another : "We want you to know that dur- 
ing the years since you left us, you have never 
been forgotten at our family altar." 

Another : "Do you remember once marry- 
ing a couple of strangers, and telling them you 
hoped they would commence their home life 
with a family altar? Well, we did, and we 
thank you for it." 



98 



V. 

THE CHALLENGE 

By FRANK E. JENKINS, D.D. 

Young man, your life has come out of the 
splendid nineteenth century to do the work 
of the twentieth. Into your life is wrought 
the energy of the ages. 

Your natural impulses are altruistic. You 
can become selfish and sordid only by casting 
out the best there is in you and consenting to 
your own belittling. The appeal of needy hu- 
manity strikes chords that God placed in you 
and they will resound as long as you are true 
to your own constitution as it came from the 
hand of God. 

The twentieth century with its opening vis- 
tas of opportunity challenges your better self 
to be true to itself. It demands, first of all, 
that you be a man — a large man. It then de- 

99 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

mands that you be a specialist in life and do 
some one thing for humanity with all the 
ability there is in you. It demands that you 
cultivate your native ability until it shall have 
all the strength and skill you can give it. The 
twentieth century has no place for crudeness 
or crude work. It demands the trained mind, 
the trained hand, the steady nerve of assured 
skill. Business, the professions, the State, all 
open before you — avenues for your best ac- 
tivities. 

But this twentieth century with its possi- 
bilities of paradise and millennium conditions 
before its close challenges the best of you to 
consider the claims of the master profession 
— the ministry of the gospel of Jesus Christ, 
the Great Leader of the hosts of progress. 

The physical and the intellectual get their 
value from the moral and spiritual. They get 
their immortality thus. All the activities of 
life get their glory in exalted and immortal 
character. 

We need good business men, physicians, 

IOO 



THE CHALLENGE 

lawyers, statesmen; we need good ministers 
more, for they are the character-makers and 
w r ork-inspirers. 

You must not accept this challenge lightly. 
You are asked to undertake the largest work 
of life. You are challenged to a life-work of 
skillful toil. You must know men, life, and 
books. You must have such a fund of in- 
formation and be able to communicate it so 
interestingly as to draw people to hear you on 
themes in which they are not directly inter- 
ested. From what they are interested in, you 
must compel their interest in the vital things 
of life. 

If you are to do all this you must study, 
study, study ; think, think, think ; work, work, 
work; try, try, try. There is no royal road 
to this ; it is work, hard, glorious work. Yon 
can and you must become interesting. You 
can and you must fill every auditorium in 
which you are called to stand. You can and 
you must do it by the sweat of your face and 
the fire of your soul. You can compass it: 

IOI 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

you must. The needs of the world demand it. 

You must grow from largeness to large- 
ness; from strength to strength; from one 
degree of ability and skill to another. 

You are challenged to use this power in 
the highest service of man; to discuss the 
great themes of destiny and successful living; 
to bring men face to face with their better 
selves and their higher possibilities; to make 
them see God and enthrone Him in their work- 
aday lives. 

You are challenged to secure the best educa- 
tion that diligence, persistence, the schools 
and universities can give; to work hard for 
years before your real life-work begins, so 
that when you step forth to the duties of the 
master profession it shall be with the tread 
of a young giant; to hold yourself to the en- 
thusiasm of your early choice through all the 
grind and grime of thorough preparation; to 
let no other alluring profession entice you from 
the path to the master profession. Money, 
fame, earthly power — what are they? You 



THE CHALLENGE 

are on your way to a throne to sit with the 
Master of the universe and share His plans 
and His power and His victories. You are to 
set loose the potencies of creative energy to 
make a new earth and a new heaven wherein 
dwell righteousness, peace, joy and love. This 
challenge will test the warp and woof of your 
being. If you are not the real thing, you will 
fall out by the way. 

You are challenged to lead the church into 
its larger work, into its conquest of the world 
as territory to be held and as meal to be leav- 
ened. You are to lead it out of the crudities 
of a narrow evangelism into the harmonies of 
an evangelism that is the art of saving all 
men for service and all society for its better, 
larger, completer life. 

You are challenged for the leadership of 
men — men whose strength has gone to busi- 
ness and the lower politics for want of leader- 
ship to a larger business outlook and the 
greater politics. The twentieth century needs 
a religion that touches all life and exalts it,* 
103 



THE MASTER PROFESSION 

reaches all men with a stronger manhood ; sets 
free all the best forces for play in the affairs 
of men. 

Yon are challenged to enter a new order of 
the ministry; to preach not in nice sounding 
phrases to tickle the fancy, but for results ; to 
mingle with men as a man not for ''hail-fellow- 
well-met" reasons, but to lead them to a fuller 
manhood. 

You are challenged to present to the needs 
of this century a great, compelling personality 
that shall speak through every vibration of 
your vocal chords and through every quivering 
of excited muscles the message of life, present 
and everlasting life. 

You are challenged to a ministry so vital 
and growing that it shall know no dead-line in 
time; and when you are indeed dead one that 
will speak on in memory and life forces. 

You are challenged to a work of faith that 
shall sow beside all waters and on all kinds 
of ground, and not mind the harvest until it 
comes. 

104 



THE CHALLENGE 

The master profession is waiting for the 
master in it. No other has such possibilities, 
such power, such effectiveness, such rewards, 
such abounding satisfaction, such approval of 
God. 



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